


the middle

by cherrytreebridge



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: 5+1 Things, ADHD bokuto rights, Character Study, Fluff, M/M, and more bokuaka brainrot, kind of, oh my god i just write character studies when im sad, teen rating is just for the f word again lmao i think it's only fair
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:35:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25619737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cherrytreebridge/pseuds/cherrytreebridge
Summary: Bokuto Koutarou knows five things about himself:1. He is energetic, and sometimes too loud, and sometimes doesn’t have a filter.2. He has the capability to devote his full attention to about one thing at a time.3. It was easy to be swept up in his emotions, especially the negative ones.4. Sometimes his brain moves faster than his body, and sometimes his body moves faster than his brain.5. Between all his fears, the one common thread is that he is completely and irrevocably afraid of change.
Relationships: Akaashi Keiji/Bokuto Koutarou
Comments: 16
Kudos: 103





	the middle

**Author's Note:**

> my little sister moved away for college on tuesday, the biggest change of her life. this is my love letter to her.
> 
> title from "the middle" by jimmy eat world

As much as it hurts to admit, the reality is that often we are judged by others for what we can’t control, and the things that make us different color the perception that others will make of us, for better or for worse. 

And a person could spend an entire life trying to prove that the real self and the projected self can and should be the same, to make the way the world sees them match perfectly with the way they see themself. Of course, this requires the person to fully and innately understand themselves, which is more often than not something we aren’t capable of. 

Bokuto Koutarou knows five things about himself:

  1. He is energetic, and sometimes too loud, and sometimes doesn’t have a filter.
  2. He has the capability to devote his full attention to about one thing at a time.
  3. It was easy to be swept up in his emotions, especially the negative ones.
  4. Sometimes his brain moves faster than his body, and sometimes his body moves faster than his brain.
  5. Between all his fears, the one common thread is that he is completely and irrevocably afraid of change.



These were not the only things he knew about himself. He also knew that he loved to play volleyball. Yakiniku was his favorite food. He was bad at math. He had trouble with spelling. He liked to be around people. He was also nervous around people, especially when he thought they didn’t like him. 

But all these things were facts, little pieces of himself that could be recited from memory, written down on a paper and presented as a taste of who he was. It was plenty possible to be friends with him with or without knowing those things, or knowing only those things. In many senses, Bokuto was an open book, he wore his heart on his sleeve, and he loved and loved and loved seemingly without end, he was somehow both innately attuned to others and also dense as a fucking brick, and the juxtaposition of those things made him an interesting character to be around. That’s what he was to most people. Interesting. 

It was easy to take advantage of him, sure. It had happened before. When he was younger, he had a group of friends who were very peculiar about the way they hung out with him. They laughed at his jokes, even when he hadn’t been trying to make one. He listened to them spill their problems and tried his very best to help, even if when he brought up his own they brushed him off. They took him up on his invitations but never invited him out themselves - not that he would’ve known this, because he hadn’t yet noticed his temporary status within the group that was painfully obvious to everyone else. 

Then, of course, after however many months, when they grew tired of the way Bokuto sometimes spoke before he thought, or was too loud, or too energetic, or too clingy, or  _ whatever -  _ and they left him. 

Bokuto seems to bounce back from this just fine, like a rubber band snapping into place. On the outside, it looks like nothing has changed, that the breakup hadn’t affected him, and he was just fine moving on.

On the inside, he thought constantly about if he was too much. Too loud. Too fast. Too  _ big,  _ physically and metaphorically, taking up too much space in the room, suffocating everyone else. The anxiety of it gripped him, and as desperate as he was for interaction, it became easier to avoid it altogether.

Bokuto threw himself into the thing that brought him the most joy - volleyball. 

He loved volleyball. Since finding it when he was younger, the sport had carved itself a little place in his brain, filled it with memories and memorabilia and memorized facts that he would realistically never need, but it was  _ so _ important that he knew them. 

There was plenty of room left in the great expanse of his brain for other things - like math, like science, like reading and writing and spelling - and he did try (god, did he try) but the more he tried to think about it the more his brain refused to, on and on in an endless feedback loop. Bokuto was smart. He just needed to  _ apply  _ himself. He needed to  _ focus. _ But focusing was hard when he was hyperaware of every little thing around him all the time, the clicking of pens and humming of classmates and bouncing of his own feet against the floor. Even in his own head his thoughts were drowned out by volleyball, volleyball, volleyball. 

It was the one teacher in particular who sent him over the edge. He was young, too young to be failed by the system, and yet he was. After months of patience that only led to the same amount “ _I don’t get it”_ s as before, his teacher finally grew tired and left him to flounder among the scattered puzzle pieces of his own head, helpless to put them together. 

What was once patience turned to indifference, and then impatience, and then snappy remarks about how he should  _ get _ it by now and if he didn’t then  _ maybe he wouldn’t amount to anything, and he should stop trying _ . 

For a more unfortunate child, being left behind here would have paved the way for failure ahead. But Bokuto was lucky. 

Bokuto was lucky because his family recognized that something was wrong. The fight began on several fronts - the fight for his dad to recognize that  _ illness _ was not  _ weakness _ , the fight for Bokuto to put a name to the constant noise in his head, the fight for him to be moved from the teacher that was more than happy to throw him to the wolves. 

Slowly but surely, his dad came around. He moved classrooms. 

He got a label - Attention-Deficit Disorder.

It was a set of scary words, and put together they made a frightening image for a child to process, much less to come to terms with the label describing  _ him _ . It was nice to know there was a name for what he was feeling, and he wasn’t crazy, but that didn’t make it any easier to accept.

He grew up. He kept going. He continued to push forward stubbornly, despite what anyone said about him. 

Validated by his new label, he was armed with a new way to organize the chaos of his head and his surroundings. The meds took months of adjusting - as these things often do - to get them just right, but the change was immediate. For the first time,  _ he  _ was in charge of what his brain focused on, even if it took some convincing, he could sit through a lecture and actually hear what was said. His words didn’t fall out of his mouth anymore, he collected them on his tongue and pieced them together before he spoke them. His grades flipped almost overnight. He made real friends. 

He still thought about volleyball constantly, but he didn’t have to feel guilty about it anymore. 

Yet amongst his newfound success, something else became glaringly obvious. He wasn’t sure when he started to notice it, but the incident that stuck out to him most was at practice one day, when he hit a cross shot that went too far too fast and landed outside the line. His coach, naturally, had said something about it. 

It hadn’t even been  _ mean _ . Looking back, Bokuto couldn’t remember exactly what was said, but he remembered how it felt like he’d just been stabbed. 

_ Coach called you out in front of the whole team _ , his brain wailed,  _ you messed that up big time.  _

He felt deflated and dejected, and it ruined the rest of his practice. 

It happened more and more often, as time went on. What started as a fear of criticism became a fear of critique, and grew into a fear of being perceived at all. People could be talking behind his back and he would never know. Worse, they could be talking right in front of him and he wouldn’t notice because he  _ wasn’t paying attention. _

He recognized the way people looked at him when his excitement got the better of him. Even with his meds, sometimes he thought so fast that when he wrote things down he’d skip a word without even noticing, because his head had already filled in the gap. Sometimes his body moved before his thoughts could catch up. Once, this meant he reached for the pot of pasta before he thought to grab a towel, and burned his hand on the lid. Other times were less extreme - jumping for a ball that wasn’t his, running ahead when he shouldn’t have, starting a task before it was time. It was something that he fought to keep control of, and though he got better at doing so, it would still happen. 

As he grew up he became better at hiding the ways his ADD manifested, to the point where he thought that people would no longer look at him as an outsider, but recognize him as one of their own, completely normal, nothing out of the ordinary. 

Even so, as high school approached, he still grappled with the fear that was left - the fear that he’d be found out, and it would all crash and burn, and he’d go back to being left behind. 

* * *

As much as it hurts to admit, the reality is that often we judge others in ways we can’t control, and the things that make us different often lead to fear, to othering, to ignorance.

And a person could spend an entire life trying to prove that their differences made them no less a person, no less than the ones judging them, to make the way the world sees them unmarred by the stereotypes of differences. Of course, this requires the person to fully and innately accept that there will always be others unlike them, and that despite this they are worthy of respect, and love, and all they have earned otherwise.

Bokuto Koutarou has five specific memories with Akaashi Keiji:

**1**

They are walking to the train station from practice. It is late autumn, the leaves just beginning to fall in anticipation for the season that will soon be upon them. The winter chill is blowing through, testing the air before the storms to come to drop snow on the ground and the darkness of winter over them all. 

They’re not alone - the other third years they take the train home with are trailing behind, keeping to themselves, but Bokuto is completely focused on Akaashi. 

He’s in one of the best moods of his life, he thinks, after a practice that couldn’t have gone better. He hit nearly every toss Akaashi threw him and felt  _ good _ about the vast majority of them, too, even getting a few smiles from his setter when he looked over for validation, which always made his heart soar. 

Now, Akaashi is watching him patiently, hands in his pockets, as they walk together. Bokuto can’t walk in a straight line. He’s bouncing on his toes, walking backwards to watch Akaashi’s face, moving his arms animatedly along with his words. His brain’s on autopilot, something about volleyball. The topic had probably strayed from practice to something mildly related. He’s not really paying attention to anything he says, so it takes- 

“Bokuto-san.”

-a few times- 

“...Bokuto-san.”

-for him to register-

“... _ Bokuto _ -san.”

-that Akaashi is trying to get his attention. 

When he snaps out of it, the guilt is immediate. 

“Ah! ‘M sorry ‘Kaashi, I was talking too much, wasn’t I? I didn’t mean to, I’ll stop now, in the future don’t be afraid to tell me to shut up if I’m going overboard-“

Akaashi plops a hand on his shoulder, and his mouth clamps shut. 

“Bokuto-san, I just wanted to remind you to get your subway card out before we reach the train, so we don’t get held up at the gate like last time.” 

Bokuto’s eyes widen and he fumbles for his card, pulling it out and holding it tightly in his hand. They start walking again, but he stays silent. 

“What were you talking about?” Akaashi prompts. 

“Huh?” It takes him half a second too long to understand what was said to him, but before Akaashi can repeat himself it clicks and he answers, “Oh, it’s nothing, don’t worry.”

“I thought it was interesting.” 

“I don’t even remember what I was talking about.” 

“Something about the Brazil national team that you saw?” offers Akaashi. “You watched a recording of one of their matches.”

Bokuto  _ lights up, _ because Akaashi had been  _ listening _ to him, and now his brain is running with a million things about the Brazil national team. He nearly launches back into dumping his stream of consciousness, but stops suddenly, deflating. “You sure you wanna hear about it? Aren’t I annoying?” 

Akaashi fixes him with a stare, serious, genuine. “Bokuto-san, if I thought you were annoying, why would I spend so much time with you?” 

**2**

They are studying at Akaashi’s house. 

It’s silent in his room. Akaashi has taken up residence at his desk, hunched over a textbook, scribbling down notes. Bokuto is sitting cross-legged on the floor with his flashcards scattered around him, his elbows propped up on his knees and cheeks resting in his hands.

He’s been through the stack of flashcards three or four times already, but the terms haven’t stuck with him at all. Instead, he hears the rain hitting the ground softly outside, feels the buzz of Akaashi’s desk lamp in his ears. Every time a car passes it throws long lines of light in through the window that catch his eye. He wiggles his toes in his socks - he keeps noticing the seam, and it’s bothering him but the texture of the carpet is way worse. He’s restless, needs to move but is also too tired to do so, and the guilt of not having finished studying keeps him rooted to the ground. 

Bokuto sighs, and he’s not sure how Akaashi hears through his earbuds, but he takes one out and turns around to look at him. “Bokuto-san? Are you okay?”

“Just fine,” he says, but he’s scowling, and he reaches his hands up to fuss with his hair. 

Akaashi frowns. “Are you sure?”

Bokuto settles back on his hands with a sigh, pulling his sweatshirt over the heels of his hands so he doesn’t have to feel the carpet. “Okay, no. I’m just restless, I think. Can’t focus.”

“Why not?”

Nobody’s ever asked him that before. 

Akaashi knows about his ADD - his best friend is one of the only people he feels comfortable enough to tell - so that can’t be the answer he’s looking for. But isn’t that why? Because his brain can’t focus on more than one thing at a time?

Maybe that’s it - he has to find the thing it’s focusing on instead. 

And just like that, he has a name for the itch at the back of his head that he can’t place, the feeling that he needs to  _ think _ about something, and he remembers what he needs to think about. 

“I guess I’m just thinking about something else,” he finally settles on, “and it’s distracting me.”

“Do you think talking about it would help get it off your mind? Out of your system?”

Another question he’s never been asked. 

He mulls over it for a few seconds, chewing on his lip. “Maybe, but… It’s really not a big deal, I just need to try harder-”

Akaashi has turned to face him fully, his arms crossed over the back of the chair and his head resting on them. His earbuds and phone have long since been abandoned to the corner of his desk. He’s totally relaxed, giving his full attention, and the way he looks at him makes butterflies flutter around in Bokuto’s stomach.

“You can talk to me, you know, about anything.”

Bokuto starts, looking at Akaashi. He opens his mouth to say something, then closes it, worried that too many words - or the wrong ones - will fall out.

“So let’s take a break. Talk to me.”

“I really don’t want to annoy you.”

“Bokuto-san.” Akaashi’s voice is firm, but gentle. “I like hearing about the things you like.”

That sentence alone makes him want to cry a little, but instead he shuffles together the flashcards and sits up. 

“So a couple nights ago I was on youtube, and I happened to find this nature documentary video about horned owls. I sat there and watched the  _ whole thing. _ Well, I just kept getting recommended videos about horned owls after that, and they were  _ so cool,  _ Akaashi, so I watched a bunch, and I’ve been spending the last few days reading everything about them. Did you know-”

**3**

It had been a fine practice. Not good, not bad, just fine. The team had decided to drop by the store on the way to the train station for snacks, and Bokuto agreed out of habit, but he wasn’t really into it. 

He was idly looking at the different flavors of shrimp chips when Akaashi walked up behind him. 

“You’ve been quiet today. Everything alright?”

He wants to brush it off, to say everything is fine and he’s just tired, but at this point Akaashi knows him better than he knows himself and can read him like a book. Akaashi can tell from the lack of sparkle in his eyes, the way he’s standing, and even from the way he’s carrying his bag (correctly, crossbody over one shoulder, instead of on his head) that Bokuto is decidedly not alright, but he’ll give him the chance to say it himself. 

“I don’t know,” Bokuto mumbles. It’s an honest answer. Akaashi tilts his head questioningly, and because it’s Akaashi, Bokuto explains himself. “I just feel bad. I don’t really know why.”

“Is it because you got blocked by Washio-san in the three-on-three?”

Bokuto shakes his head, not making eye contact. “No.”

“Is it because I gave a toss you called for to Konoha-san?”

“No, it’s not your fault.”

“I didn’t say it was. I’m just listing off the things that would usually bother you.”

Bokuto looks up at that, because Akaashi  _ pays attention to the things that bother him,  _ and is  _ using that to make him feel better,  _ his cheeks are warm for reasons he doesn’t have time to delve into, because Akaashi is waiting on a response. 

He almost feels guilty for what he says next. 

“Uh, I think it might be because I snapped at you, today.”

“You did?” Akaashi looks genuinely confused.

“When we were walking to the gym before practice. We were talking, and then I zoned out and when you asked me what was wrong I got upset and said I just needed a moment before practice started.” Bokuto’s shoulders slumped in on themselves. “I shouldn’t have done that. It was just loud and I had a long day, but that’s not an excuse. Then during break you didn’t come over to talk to me, so I thought you were mad, and…”

He trails off, but it’s obvious now why he’s so upset. Akaashi’s brows draw together. “I’m not mad at all. I didn’t even think much of that when it happened. And during break I got a text from my mom that I had to answer,” he explains. “I’m really sorry, Bokuto-san.”

“Why are you apologizing?”

“I didn’t realize I had upset you.”

“But I’m the one who messed up!”

Akaashi grabs two bags of shrimp chips, both Bokuto’s favorite flavor, and beckons to the counter with his head. “It was just a misunderstanding. It happens.”

Later that night, he lays in bed and texts Akaashi. 

_ I still feel bad. If not for snapping at you, then for being dramatic about it. _

Akaashi texts back quickly. 

_ You’re allowed to have emotions, Bokuto-san. _

Is he? 

_ I feel like I have too many. _

The three dots that indicate Akaashi is typing disappear and reappear several times, then the text finally appears. 

_ That’s okay too. We just have to sort through them. _

Bokuto lays on his back and stares at his ceiling, letting his phone fall to his chest. Akaashi had said  _ we. _

**4**

Bokuto is fast. On the court, he sprints with enough energy to power a few lightbulbs. Off the court, he could talk the ears off a wall. At practice, he loudly hypes up his team. In class, he bounces his leg up and down during the lecture. 

He knows he fidgets. He picks at his nails when he’s nervous and he messes with the blanket when he watches tv and he flips the pencil back and forth between his fingers when he takes notes. He tries his best to hide it, after years of classmates and teachers pointing it out or, even worse, calling it weird. 

Akaashi notices, but never says anything. Bokuto keeps waiting for the day when he’ll say that he’s being annoying when they’re doing anything together and he’s fidgeting, but it never happens. The first time he mentions it, it’s not even a complaint, it’s a concern. 

“Bokuto-san, what happened to your fingers?”

He looks down to where he’s absentmindedly picked at the cuticles of his nails so much that the skin has torn, and a few are even starting to bleed. He wipes at them quickly. “Just picking at them. Bad habit.”

“Ah,” Akaashi says, but he scowls. “Does it have to be your hands?”

“What?”

“That you mess with.”

“Oh. Uh, I guess not?”

“I’d rather you find something else then. That looks like it hurts,” frowns Akaashi. Then, much to Bokuto’s surprise and horror and some other third thing he can't place, Akaashi takes one of his hands and holds it up to his face to look at it, his thumb rubbing gently over where the skin is red and raw.

“I’m sorry?” Bokuto squeaks, and it comes out as a question. 

“No need to be,” Akaashi assures him, but he holds Bokuto’s hand the rest of the way home. Just so he won’t mess with it anymore. 

Two weeks later, Akaashi stops him before they cross the school gates. “I almost forgot,” he says, rummaging through his bag. “I got you something.”

“Ha?” Bokuto asks stupidly, because he’s too shocked to say anything else. 

Akaashi presents him with a little box, unwrapped, and looks expectantly as Bokuto opens it. The item is a little cube, and each face has something different - little buttons, switches, a roller, a groove, and the like. 

Bokuto’s jaw is hanging open, but Akaashi just shrugs. “Something for you to mess with. Instead of your hands.”

He finds the mental capacity to close his mouth and thank Akaashi properly. “I really love it, ‘Kaashi! This is so cool! But…”

“But?”

“Don’t you think it’s weird?”

“What’s weird?”

“The messing with things. Constantly moving around. That stuff.”

Akaashi blinks at him. “No, I don’t. And besides, being fast like that gives you great reflexes, on the court.”

That’s the first time anyone has ever  _ complimented _ him on one of his symptoms. 

Thank god he took his meds this morning, because his brain has slowed down just enough that he can catch himself before he blurts out something dumb.

It’s not slow enough that he can stop from throwing himself on Akaashi for a hug. 

**5**

Bokuto graduates in a week. 

They are sitting on the floor of the gym, both of them having gone to the one place they know will ground them when the rest of the world is spinning too fast to keep up. Just the two of them, they’d been practicing for an hour and a half - not practicing for anything in particular, since the season is over, but just enjoying the satisfaction that comes with the incredible way they’ve become so in sync over the past two years. 

“I don’t want to graduate,” Bokuto says to the floor. 

He sees Akaashi look over at him from the corner of his eye. “You have your whole life ahead of you.”

“I know.” He doesn’t look up.

“Bokuto-san?”

“I’m scared,” he admits, and he’s known it for months, but it’s the first time he’s said it out loud. “I have kind of a plan for after graduation, but I still don’t know what I’m doing! What if it doesn't work out? What if I have to go through all my backup plans? Or I figure out that I don’t even  _ like _ what I’m doing, and then-”

He’s hushed by the feeling of Akaashi’s hand resting on his knee. 

“You are eighteen, Bokuto-san. No one expects you to have all the answers. Just work through things as they come. You’re not alone, either. You have your parents behind you, and me, and all your friends… we’ll all help you however we can. Don’t ever feel like you have to figure everything out by yourself.”

There’s something hot prickling at the back of Bokuto’s eyes, but he ignores it. He’s worried that if he talks his voice will crack, so instead he nods. He hates crying in front of people. 

“You’re gonna be okay,” Akaashi assures him. 

“Akaashi?” he asks suddenly, looking up. It’s a miracle his voice stays steady. “Everything is changing so fast.”

“It happens, sometimes.”

“It’s all new and unfamiliar.”

“I know.”

“What if you had something really important to say, but the very thought of everything getting upended made you anxious, and you’re so worried that if things change too much they’ll never be the same again, and the thought of  _ that  _ happening makes you so sad and nervous that you’re debating even saying the thing - would you still say it? Even if it might ruin everything?”

Akaashi’s mouth pulls into a line as he looks at Bokuto, his eyebrows drawn together. “What do you mean?”

Sometimes, Bokuto moves faster than his brain does. He grabs Akaashi’s hand sitting on his knee and laces their fingers together, at the same time he says -

“I really like you, Akaashi.”

There’s silence, and he thinks,  _ This is it. This is the moment I ruin everything.  _

But Akaashi squeezes his hand, and he’s  _ smiling _ so much and the sight of it is lighting up something in Bokuto that he didn’t even know was dark. He doesn’t say anything, but he doesn’t need to. 

“Change terrifies me,” Bokuto says slowly, holding up their linked hands. “But this kind of change, with you, that might be okay. If you wanted to.”

Akaashi laughs and leans over to kiss the top of his knuckles. 

Maybe change isn’t so scary after all. 

  
  


Bokuto Koutarou knows five things about his relationship with Akaashi Keiji:

  1. Keiji is his opposite, he soaks up his energy like a sponge. He keeps him grounded. And when Koutarou is too loud, his reminders are always gentle and kind. 
  2. Keiji always encourages him to chase what makes him happy, and never is tired to hear about whatever show he’s obsessed with or fun fact he learned about owls or recount his favorite stories and jokes over and over again.
  3. He loves wholly and fully, and is swept up in his emotions, and sometimes that makes him breakable, but Keiji is always there to pick up the pieces. 
  4. Keiji is never short with him when he acts or talks before he thinks, just gently pulls him back and helps him reconnect so his brain and body move together. Then Koutarou pulls Keiji with him and gives him half of that energy to keep.
  5. No matter what changes, the two of them together is something that never will.



**+1**

Once, in an interview, Bokuto was asked what made him stand out as a player on the National Team. 

“Well,” he says with a laugh, “I have ADHD.”

The interviewer’s eyebrows raise. “Oh? Do you mean it’s a challenge you’ve had to overcome?”

Bokuto laughs again, though now it’s real and big and genuine. “Sorry, there’s a misunderstanding! I’m better  _ because  _ I have it.”

In many senses, Bokuto was an open book, he wore his heart on his sleeve, and he loved and loved and loved seemingly without end, he was somehow both innately attuned to others and also dense as a fucking brick. He was loud and energetic and lit up any room he was in. He jumped in feet first. Volleyball was his first love and Akaashi Keiji was his second, and he knew everything there was to know about both of them. 

“I know I’m only mentioning it now, after playing professionally for years, but I figured-” he shrugs, smiles. “If there’s another hyperactive kid out there playing volleyball, I just want them to know they’ll be fine.”

**Author's Note:**

> will I ever be able to write anything but bokuaka fluff? jury's out
> 
> if you have any well wishes or good luck to spare, it would mean a lot if you could send some to my baby sis
> 
> thanks for reading <3


End file.
